
Mazda helping women feel more confident on the road
This Women’s Month, Mazda Southern Africa is encouraging women to learn something that could make a real difference: how to change a flat tyre.
- Industry News
- 8 August 2025
Mercedes-Benz recently announced from its Stuttgart headquarters that it will delay its electrification goal by five years and assured investors it would keep sprucing up its combustion engine models.
This made the company the latest one in a growing line of carmakers to flag a weaker-than-expected appetite for battery-powered cars.
The company now expects sales of electrified vehicles, including hybrids, to account for up to 50% of the total by 2030 - five years later than its forecast from 2021, when it aimed to hit the 50% milestone by 2025 with mostly all-electric cars.
While automakers and suppliers are betting big on future demand for electric vehicles, investment in capacity and technology development has outrun actual EV demand, prompting carmakers to readjust production plans.
CEO Ola Kaellenius cautioned towards the end of last year that even in Europe sales would likely not be all-electric by 2030, with battery-powered cars currently making up just 11% of total sales, and 19% including hybrids.
Ola says Mercedes-Benz wanted customers and investors to know it was well-positioned to carry on producing combustion engine cars and was ready to update the technology well into next decade.
Its current plans for updates mean "it is almost like we will have a new line-up in 2027 that will take us well into the 2030s," Ola says.
Shares in the luxury carmaker were up 5.9% following the news, also supported by a R62 billion (three billion euro) share buyback programme unveiled.
Slower economic growth, supply chain bottlenecks and trade tensions between China and both the US and European Union also weighed on Mercedes-Benz's outlook for 2024, the carmaker said, forecasting lower returns on sales across its car and van divisions.
Chery South Africa showcased the latest addition to its Tiggo 7 range; the CSH Plug-in Hybrid’s efficiency on a road trip managed to squeeze 1 290km from a single tank of petrol.
No battery, no power. It is a simple truth about that important component, which ensures our vehicles can move from A to B.
The demand for new energy vehicles (NEVs) keep growing in South Africa with a steep increase in greener mobility during the last two years.